WASHINGTON—A broad coalition of broadcasters and the National Association of Broadcasters have filed reply comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) calling for the repeal of its national television ownership rule, which the filing said “unfairly prevents broadcasters from reaching more than 39% of the total number of TV households in the country.”
“This filing reflects an extraordinary level of consensus across America’s broadcasters,” said NAB president and CEO Curtis LeGeyt. “The message is clear: it is time to eliminate the outdated national TV ownership cap. Broadcasters are united in calling on the FCC to level the playing field and give local stations a fair shot to compete, invest in journalism and continue providing our communities with trusted news and public safety information. The record leaves no doubt that the public interest is best served by empowering broadcasters, not restraining them.”
The filing was made by the National Association of Broadcasters, ABC Owned Television Stations, ABC Television Affiliates Association, CBS News and Stations, CBS Television Network Affiliates Association, Entravision, E.W. Scripps Co., FBC Television Affiliates Association, Fox Television Stations, LLC, NBC Television Affiliates, Nexstar Media Inc., Sinclair Inc., and Trinity Broadcasting Network.
In the filing the broadcasters “strongly urge the Commission to eliminate the national television ownership cap for all TV broadcasters. The Joint Broadcasters have joined together for these reply comments because each association and company believe strongly that, in a marketplace dominated by the likes of Google/YouTube, Amazon, Meta, and Netflix, no justification exists for broadcasters – and only broadcasters – to remain subject to this antiquated and harmful restriction.”
The filing also addressed worries that comments by FCC Chair Brendan Carr attacking the broadcast networks for political bias, might lead the agency to establish a two tiered ownership system, with ongoing limits for stations owned by broadcast networks.
“As the Commission considers next steps, the agency must continue to apply any national audience reach cap equally to all station owners, whether the stations are network-owned, network-affiliated, or independent,” the filing said. “All stations meaningfully contribute to the Commission’s localism goals by producing and distributing important local news, local public affairs, and other locally oriented programming for the communities they serve and compete in the broader video media marketplace. The Joint Broadcasters also note the legal complexity of not applying the cap (or lifting it) uniformly and believe the Commission should instead be focused on completing this long-standing rulemaking expeditiously by eliminating the cap universally.”
The filing also reiterates arguments that broadcasters have made against those who claim the FCC lacks the authority to change the rules; complaints by unions and consumer groups that consolidation would hurt localism, not advance it; and a variety of arguments by pay TV groups saying consumers would be harmed consolidated station groups who could demand much higher retransmission fees.
“Now in its ninth decade of artificially limiting the audiences of all television broadcasters and unchanged since 2004, the national ownership cap unfairly prevents broadcasters but none of our myriad competitors from reaching more than 39 percent of the total number of TV households in the country,” the filing noted. “This restriction skews the media and advertising markets in favor of digital advertising behemoths, increasingly consolidated pay TV/broadband providers, and unregulated global streaming platforms, at the expense of the only video service offering increasingly rare local journalism, emergency information, and popular entertainment and sports programming to communities across the nation at no cost to the public. The extensive record here, begun in 2017 and refreshed this year, reveals no basis for retaining the outdated national TV cap.”
The full filing can be found here.
